Intentions of the Pious

Intentions of the Pious
بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمَنِ الرَّحِيمِ

At gatherings of remembrance; before reading about the Prophet and his life (may Allah bless him and grant him peace), the scholars traditionally make a number of intentions, followed by a recitation of Surat al-Fatihah; donating its reward to the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) in the hope that their remembrance and their intentions are accepted.

Here are some of the intentions that Sayyidi al-Habib `Umar bin Hafiẓ (may Allah preserve him and benefit us by him) makes at these blessed gatherings. The original Arabic is also provided below.

We recite the Fatihah..

with the intention that Allah—by us remembering Him and remembering His Messenger, our Master Muhammad (may Allah bless him and grant him and his Family and Companions peace) and his birth and awesome attributes—opens the doors to attaining His support and assistance and guidance and to attaining uprightness and the speedy relief of the suffering of the Islamic Ummah..

with the intention that Allah deflects calamities from us and from all of the people of la ilaha ill’Allah in the East and the West..

with the intention that He grants us His guidance in all our movements and our stillness and that He makes us firm upon the truth in what we say, we do and we believe..

with the intention that He enables us to perfect our following of this Prophet, the Chosen One, Muhammad (may Allah bless him and grant him and his Family and Companions peace) in our words and deeds and intentions and aims and desires and our movements and our stillness and in every state, inward and outward, and that He allows us to beautify our emulation of him and allows us to walk along his path and drink from the waters he has drunk from..

with the intention that by him (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) He looks upon us, our families, our children, those dear to us and our descendants and upon those who are attached to us..

with the intention that He fills our hearts with the light of faith and certainty and knowledge of Him.. that He makes us among those He has chosen to bring close to Him and among those He has blessed with the realities of sincere and pure slavehood to Him..

with the intention that He protects us from all harm and that He rectifies the inward and the outward, and that He allows us to attain the realities of taqwa..

with the intention that He makes the Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) pleased with his Ummah and that He makes us, our families, our children and our friends a joy to his eye..

and that He grants us the greatest portion of His remembrance and the remembrance of this Prophet, the Chosen One..

and that He grants us the greatest portion of His closeness and the closeness of this Prophet, the Chosen One..

and that He grants us the greatest portion of His love and the love of this Prophet, the Chosen One..

and that He grants us the greatest portion of His care and the care of this Prophet, the Chosen One..

and that He grants us the greatest portion of His pleasure and the pleasure of this Prophet, the Chosen One..inwardly and outwardly in every state and in every affair in this life, the Barzakh, the next life and that He gathers us together in the highest level of Firdaws while He is pleased with us.

with the intention that He gives us the greatest portion of being with him in the Barzakh and in the shade of the Throne and at the Pool and when he passes over the Bridge, and when he enters Paradise (may Allah bless him and grant him and his Family and Companions peace).

with the intention that He rectifies our hearts and our bodies, our inward and our outward and all our affairs, that He deflects all evil from us..

with the intention that He raises the ranks of the pious people of this Ummah and all the pious people and that we receive the blessings of the Prophets and Messengers and their families and those that follow them with excellence and that He gives them the greatest of rewards on our behalf and that He unites us with them in the Abode of Mercy while He is pleased with us, without any prior punishment or reprimand or trial or account..

with the intention of removing the tribulations that have befallen us and all the Muslims inwardly and outwardly..

with the intention that Allah blesses us with the most noble of attributes and unites us with the best of groups and that He rectifies every affair inwardly and outwardly in this life and the next..

with the intention that he gives us the best of endings in goodness, gentleness and wellbeing..

with the intentions that the pious people have made and will make and all pious intentions that the knowledge of our Lord, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful, encompasses for us and the whole Ummah..

We donate the reward of the Fatihah to the spirit of the Prophet Muhammad (may Allah bless him and grant him and his Family and Companions peace) – al-Fatihah.

Please include the translator, Ustadh Amin Buxton (Allah preserve him and his teachers, and benefit us by them), in your prayers. #Dont forget to put your hands up and say Ameen :)
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Summer Course in Dowra, Tarim, Yemen with Habib Umar

Dowra In Tarim with Habib Umar

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Inside Tarim Yemen the land of the Habaibs:)

Allah Most High has blessed and honoured the lands of Yemen and given this country a unique status that no other place (besides the two sacred cities of Makkah and Madina) enjoys. There are many virtues mentioned in the various narrations (ahadith) regarding Yemen and the people residing there. This land has also been the abode of many Prophets (peace be upon them all), Companions (sahaba), scholars and pious servants of Allah (Allah be pleased with them all). Of the many narrations wherein the virtues of Yemen and its inhabitants have been mentioned, some are reproduced below:

1) Imam al-Bukhari relates from Abu Mas’ud that the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) gestured with his hands towards Yemen and said: “Belief (iman) is there….” (Sahih al-Bukhari, no: 4126 & Sahih Muslim, no: 81)

2) Sayyiduna Abu Hurayra (Allah be pleased with him) narrates that the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) said: “The people of Yemen have come to you and they are extremely gentle and soft-hearted. Belief (iman) is that of the Yemenis and wisdom (hikma) is that of the Yemenis. Pride and haughtiness are the characters of the owners of camels, and calmness and solemnity are the qualities of the owners of sheep.” (Sahih al-Bukhari, no: 4127)

3) Sayyiduna Abu Hurayra (Allah be pleased with him) narrates that the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) said: “The people of Yemen have come to you. They are tender-hearted and more delicate of soul. The capacity to understand (fiqh) is of the Yemenis and wisdom is that of the Yemenis.” (Sahih al-Bukhari, no: 4129 & Sahih Muslim, no: 84)

Imam an-Nawawi (Allah have mercy on him) mentions in his commentary of Sahih Muslim that there is no bar in attributing these narrations literally to the people of Yemen. They (the people of Yemen) had strong faith in the time of the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace), and the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) sensed this from the people of Yemen such as; Abu Muslim al-Khawlani, Uways al-Qarni and the delegations that came to him from Yemen. Hence, attributing faith (iman) to Yemen meant that the people of Yemen had strong and complete faith, but this did not negate that others also had strong faith.

As far as Fiqh and Hikma are concerned, the former (fiqh) means to have a deep understanding of religion, whilst the latter (hikma) refers to having conscious acknowledgment of Allah Most High (ma’rifa), coupled with self-reformation, good character and abstaining from following one’s desires and falsehood.

The meaning of “they are extremely gentle and soft-hearted” is that they are the people of timidity (khashya) and have an attitude of humble acceptance (istikana). They are extremely quick in accepting genuine advice and Nasiha, and are easily affected by it. They are immune from harshness, hard-heartedness and ruggedness. (See: Nawawi, al-Minhaj Sharh Sahih Muslim, P: 158-159)

The above few narrations related from the beloved of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) single out Yemen and its inhabitants with great qualities. Strong faith, complete belief and true conviction is said to exist in Yemen, with the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) gesturing and pointing his hands in the direction of Yemen and saying “Iman is there”. Similarly, the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) cites wisdom and deep understanding of religion to exist in Yemen. Moreover, when a delegation comes to the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace), he mentions the qualities and characteristics of the people of Yemen saying that they are extremely soft-hearted people and very humble.

The few narrations above have been taken directly from the two most authentic books of Hadith, namely Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim. However, these narrations are not the only ones recorded in the praise of Yemen and its inhabitants; rather, there are many other Ahadith. Let us look at some more narrations in this regard:

5) Sayyiduna Zayd ibn Thabit (Allah be pleased with him) narrates that the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) looked towards Yemen and said: “O Allah! Turn their hearts (towards Iman)…” (Sunan Tirmidhi, no: 3934)

6) Sayyiduna Abu Hurayra (Allah be pleased with him) narrates that the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) said: “…..And trustworthiness (amana) is in (the tribe of) Azd, meaning in Yemen.” (Sunan Tirmidhi, no: 3936)

7) Sayyiduna Jubayr ibn Mut’im (Allah be pleased with him) narrates that once the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) looked up towards the heavens and said: “The people of Yemen have come to you like the pieces of clouds. They are the best of people on the face of the earth.” A Companion asked: “O Messenger of Allah! Are they even better than us?” The Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) replied: “Except you.” (Musnad of Imam Ahamd, Musnad Bazzar and Musnad Abu Ya’la. See: Majma’ al-Zawa’id, 10/54)

8) Sayyiduna Amr ibn Abasa (Allah be pleased with him) relates that Uyayna ibn Hisn al-Fazari once remarked in the presence of the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) that the best of men are ….the people of Najd. The Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) replied: “You have lied! Rather, the best of men are the people of Yemen. Belief/faith (iman) is Yemeni and I am also a Yemeni.” (Tabrani and Ahmad, with all the narrators in the chain authentic (thiqat). See: Majma’ al-Zawa’id, 10/44)

In this last Hadith, it was mentioned in the presence of the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) that the people of Najd were the best of people, but the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) was quick to reject this notion saying that this was wrong; rather, the people of Yemen were the best amongst people. This Hadith reminds us of another narration recorded by Imam al-Bukhari and others wherein the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) said: “O Allah! Give us Baraka in our Sham, O Allah! Give us Baraka in our Yemen.” They said: “And in our Najd?” and he said: “O Allah! Give us Baraka in our Sham, O Allah! Give us Baraka in our Yemen.” They said: “And in our Najd?” and I believe that he said on the third occasion: “In that place (najd) are earthquakes and seditions, and in that place shall rise the devil’s horn.” (See: Sahih al-Bukhari, no: 990)

In the final part of the last Hadith, the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) referred himself as a Yemeni. The reason could be (And Allah knows best) that “ Yemen” was in fact the name of Qahtan’s son, and Qahtan was a forefather of the Arabs and was from the children of Sayyiduna Isma’il (peace be upon him). Hence, the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) had a relationship of ancestry with the Yemenis. It could also mean that the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) was implying that he liked the character and manners of the Yemenis; hence he referred himself to be “as” a Yemeni for having something in common with them. Whatever the reason may be, the fact that the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) called himself a Yemeni is such a virtue for the people of Yemen that it cannot be underestimated.

9) In another narration, the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) is reported to have said: “Faith is of the Yemenis, and they (the people of Yemen) are from me and their direction is towards me, even if they are far from me in distance. It will be very soon that they come to you as helpers (ansar); hence I command you to be good with them.” (Tabrani with a sound [Hasan] chain. See: Majma’ al-Zawa’id, 10/55)

There are also other Ahadith in which the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) praised the tribes of Yemen such as the tribes of Himyar and Azd. He said that a time will come when a man will wish that his father and mother were from the tribe of Azd. (See: Sunan Tirmidhi, no: 3937). He (Allah bless him & give him peace) also said that the people of Himyar are the people of trustworthiness and faith. (See: Sunan Tirmidhi, no: 3939). Thus, the Ahadith and narrations praising the lands of Yemen and its people are numerous to the extent that if one was to gather all of them with commentary, an entire book may be compiled!

Any Muslim who has knowledge of these sayings of the beloved of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) would naturally long to visit Yemen and its people. Indeed, the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him & give him peace) made these remarks according to his time, but when Allah Most High places certain qualities in a people, the effect of these qualities remain even after centuries have elapsed. Moreover, Yemen was also the abode of many of the Messenger of Allah’s Companions. He (Allah bless him & give him peace) sent Sayyiduna Mu’az ibn Jabal (Allah be please with him) to Yemen. There are also other Companions who lived and taught in Yemen. All of this in addition to the fact that Yemen has produced, and continues to produce, some of the greatest scholars, Mujtahids, Imams and saints of this Ummah.

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